1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a medical control system used as a treatment tool inserted into a body cavity, and configured to acquire image information on an affected part to be medically treated or provide medical treatment.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, an endoscopic apparatus inserted into a body cavity, and configured to be used to observe an affected part or the like is known. An insertion section of the endoscopic apparatus to be inserted into the body cavity is configured in such manner that a distal end part thereof can be freely curved in order that the insertion section may be moved back-and-forth along bends inside the body cavity, and those points and areas observation of which is desired may be imaged.
The curvature mechanism has a configuration in which the distal end part is divided into a plurality of short rods, and the rods are coupled to each other through joints. Each of these joints is connected to a wire to be thereby connected to an angle knob provided on the proximal end side. By operating the angle knob, the degree of traction of the wire is adjusted, whereby it is possible to freely curve the curvature mechanism.
In this curvature mechanism, the operator (observer) curves the insertion section by his or her own manual operation, and hence a heavy burden of the operation is imposed on the operator. In order to reduce such a burden, an electric-powered type mechanism using a motor is considered. More specifically, an electric drive source such as a motor is connected to each wire, the wires are pulled by the designation operation of switches provided at the operation section, thereby bending the joints. A technique of reducing the burden to be imposed on the operator by carrying out an operation aid in the manner described above is proposed.
The operation of delicately bending the insertion section involves electric drive means based on a switch operation, and hence the feeling of the operator differs from that of the manual operation, and the adjustment of the operation becomes difficult. For example, in the technique described in Pat. Document 1, a sensor configured to detect an amount of change (degree of bend) in the insertion section is provided to passively control the curvature drive section according to the detected amount of change. As the sensor, for example, a potentiometer and encoder are used, and a control amount of the curving operation of the curvature drive section is determined according to the detected amount of change and designation input based on the switch (angle knob).